After the Funeral
by Min Daae
Summary: AU. Darkdarkdark; unforeseen circumstances lead to something neither brother has ever really considered. Rating for darkness.


They said it was a coronary, a hidden defect – they had some name for it, some long and complicated name, but I don't remember it. It didn't really matter. I just remember seeing the doctors come out with their grim faces on and I knew before they said anything because my heart was in my stomach and stuttered a beat or two like it wanted to stop too.

It was all a nightmare, just one more nightmare, I'd had many like it before.

No real reason they could find for it, they said. Autopsy would be continuing, and I nearly exploded, _no, no, you won't _and they stepped back and said _wait, kid, how old are you, _and I lied _twenty one _and then Promise was there smoothing things over even though I could see the grief in her eyes. I just felt empty.

Tired.

She told Robin to keep an eye on me but it was easy to slip away from him, he was busy too, busy in his own feelings making his own arrangements to get his body back. That didn't matter either. A body's a body. How many had I seen?

I could still see coming home and Niko was lying on the floor turning blue, I'd just gone out to get some Chinese takeout, ten minutes max. When I left he was fine. The hospital said there was nothing they could have done.

That didn't matter either.

Maybe if I went home and got some sleep it would all go away. I don't really remember walking back from the hospital. Promise and Robin must have noticed I was gone but they didn't come after me; I guess they thought I needed to be alone. That was good. I did want to be alone.

The apartment door was unlocked, the way I'd left it. No one had broken in; we had nothing to take. I closed the door and locked it behind me, walked down the hall, past my room, turned left instead of right.

Niko's room was bigger than mine. I'd made him take it. We drew straws, yeah, but I made sure he got the shorter straw, and I think he knew because he gave me that look he'd give me sometimes, but he let it slide.

It looked just the way it always did. Neat, perfect. The closet door was open and a couple blades were hanging polished to a shine. Nik's babies. His bed was perfectly made. The alarm clock was still set to 5:15 and going off faintly.

I turned it off and just stood there staring at it for a while. Eventually I turned around and closed the door to Niko's room, locked that one too, just in case, and lay down on the bed. I pressed my face into the pillow because it smelled like Nik and I closed my eyes.

I might have cried. I don't know. I don't really remember anything. The edges of it are all fuzzy and weird and indistinct. I know after a while the world kind of went away and maybe I was asleep and maybe it was something else but it didn't matter. Somewhere I didn't think anything would ever matter again.

I didn't open my eyes for a long time.

_Caliban, _it was Promise, I could recognize her voice, _Caliban, what are you doing, _and I didn't even bother to move or answer. It wasn't important enough, and if I moved I might lose the pillow that smelled like Niko, because somehow I was holding his smell in it and if I let go it would go away and somehow – somehow that'd make everything real.

She touched my shoulder, though, gave it a little shake. She still sounded sad, like she'd been crying too much. _Caliban, you need to get up. You've been here two days. Eat something, at least._

It was hard to find my voice, but I hunted it down enough to say _I'm not hungry _which wasn't even a lie, I hadn't been hungry since trying to eat the Chinese takeout and feeling it sit like a lead lump in my stomach. I closed my eyes again. _Let me sleep, okay? It's fine, _and god, I'd never told a bigger lie than that one, but it was a pretty good lie. At least, my voice didn't break. And it came out at all.

There was a pained noise from the doorway, and Promise looked up and said _no, wait _and touched my shoulder and said _Niko, _she said, _Niko wouldn't want you to do this. _

I can't exactly remember what happened except that I turned my head and looked at her and she almost flinched, kind of – Promise the vampire, flinched, and heard this voice that wasn't mine say _don't tell me what he wouldn't want, don't you dare, he doesn't want anything anymore anyway _and Robin stepped in and said

_Cal don't you want to be there for the funeral? _

and I closed my eyes again and said _no not really, go without me, just a dead body anyway. _I had to try harder to block out their voices, but eventually they were just a sort of muted humming. Then they went away. Giving up. I was relieved.

I realized I hadn't had any water for days now. I didn't feel thirsty, either. Didn't feel anything at all except cold. I wanted Niko to hug me and make it all better.

But Niko had died, not even fighting, just a stupid accident, a freak screwup. It didn't even occur to me to think that life wasn't fair, though. I knew that.

The next time they came by to talk they brought someone else and my shields were down so they were touching me before I could move, but then I moved and jerked away and hissed _don't touch me all right get your hands off me _and it took me a second to put a name to the face. Rafferty. What'd they think Rafferty could do for me? He held up his hands though and said all quietly _it's okay, Cal, it's me, _and I pulled further back and almost bared my teeth at him, but that would have meant pulling my face out of the pillow too far, and I didn't want to lose it.

And Promise was talking and saying _you see now, I don't know what to do, I can't just leave him like this, he's been there for four days and I don't think he'll ever move…he's going to starve to death, or something…I can't let that happen. Niko loved him so much _and I hated them, hated them all for saying his name like that, like they had a right to it.

And Rafferty said _what do you want me to do? I don't know, I don't know jack shit, not about this. Maybe if something was broken I could set. But God, this – I don't even know what's happened _and I knew they were talking about me, but at least he wasn't trying to touch me anymore, so I curled up again and lay down and tried to find the nice nice quiet dark place I could get to. I could feel them watching me, but that's all they did, watch.

And their voices followed me down, Promise's so quiet _he's going to die _and Rafferty's even quieter _yes probably. _

I had a dream I went to hell and never came back. And when I got there Niko was waiting, and he was dead, but he kind of smiled at me and reached out his hands and said _come on, Cal, it's not that bad, just come with me _and he was Nik so I just said _okay _and got up and went. It wasn't like I didn't know where I was going, or what I was doing, because I did, it was just that it didn't matter.

And then someone tackled me and I could hear them saying _nonononono_ and I went out and that was it.

*

I came back and I wasn't in Niko's bed and I wasn't in Niko's room and someone was already yelling at me _Caliban what do you think you're doing what the _hell _do you think you're doing _that was Robin. I just kind of opened my eyes and looked at him and he stiffened and went _Do you even know what you did? _

And I said _yes, I know _and he demanded _what? _And I told him all calm _I opened a gateway to Tumulus _and he looked like he was going to explode but Promise said _why? _And I told her. I told her _so I could go through _and shut my mouth and closed my eyes and let them yell about that.

Robin said _Cal, Niko's not going to be there _and I said _I know but it doesn't matter he's not here either _and that was all I said _he told me to anyway _and Promise said _what? _sounding a little nervous and I shook my head and added _no, in a dream, can you go yell somewhere else? _

They didn't, though, just stayed there and yelled and eventually the words stopped meaning anything and I stopped pretending to listen as they went back and forth _maybe it'd be better to – no don't even say he'll come out of it eventually _and it was Robin who said _no, no, I don't think he will. _

And Promise said _I'm going to get Rafferty _and finally they were quiet so I could go away again. And that was nice. This time Niko gave me a puppy and said _okay Cal, you can keep him this time _and I told him I'd rather have him than the puppy any day and he ruffled my hair and laughed until his face turned blue.

It was almost a good dream, except for that.

*

They give me something to keep me from dreaming, so I don't see Niko anymore, not at all. They make me eat things and even though they don't taste like anything and I don't know if I can starve anymore they do it anyway, old things I used to like. I obey because it's easier than saying no. One of them is always watching me, just in case, in case I try something I guess.

I heard Robin yesterday say _I think maybe he's getting better _and Promise agreed, and that's good. Because they watch me now, but they can't always be watching me, and sooner or later I'll slip out from under their eyes and go walking, and maybe when I go walking I'll find a river and maybe I'll go swimming, and I think it might be nice to dive down and see how deep the water goes. Or maybe I'll just open a gateway and go home to hell. It's not hard.

They watch me now, but that's okay. They can't watch forever.

I can wait a long time.


End file.
